The Actress in High Life eBook

“Why, were we not fighting their battles?”
Lady Mabel exclaimed. “Would they not assist
in their own defence?”

“Badajoz is not within sight of Evora, and that
was enough for these short-sighted patriots.”

“Has such blind selfishness a parallel?”
asked Lady Mabel.

“Many,” said L’Isle. “We
may at times find one at home, in the wisdom of a
whig ministry, which consists in taking a microscopic
view of the wrong side of things just under their
noses.”

They now mounted their horses, and leaving the praca,
had entered on a narrow and somewhat crooked street,
where they suddenly met a funeral procession, with
its priests, crucifix and tapers, the dead being carried
by several persons on a bier, and followed by a few
peasants. The travelers drew up their horses close
to the adjacent wall, to leave room for the procession.
The face of the dead was uncovered as usual, and the
friar’s dress which clothed the body, with the
rosaries and other paraphernalia displayed about his
person, led Lady Mabel to say, “I see that one
of the good fathers is gone to his account.”

“He will now find out,” said Moodie, “the
worth of his beads, crucifix and holy water.”

“I am surprised,” said Lady Mabel, “at
so unpretending a funeral, in the case of a member
of the great order of St. Francis.”

L’Isle asked a question of a Portuguese standing
near, and then said, “The cowl does not make
the monk, nor must you infer from his dress that this
man was a friar. He lived all his life a peasant
in a neighboring village.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed Lady Mabel.

“Almost every one,” said L’Isle,
as they turned to ride on their way, “here and
throughout the Peninsula, is buried in a religious
habit—­the men in the uniform of friars,
the women dressed like pilgrims, and the girls like
nuns. They are loaded with a freight of rosaries,
agni dei, and other saintly jewelry, fastened
to the neck, hands and feet, and stuffed into the
clothes. Convents have often a warehouse appropriated
to this posthumous wardrobe, in the sale of which
they drive a profitable trade. It was a most natural
mistake made by a stranger, who, after being a few
weeks at Madrid, and seeing so many Franciscans interred,
expressed his astonishment at the prodigious number
of them in the city, and asked if their order was
not entirely carried off by this violent epidemic.”

“I suppose,” said Lady Mabel, “the
custom originated in the propensity so strong in us
all, to live sinners and die saints.”

“Exactly so,” L’Isle answered; “it
is a fraudulent custom, old as the fifth century,
and common in popish countries. It is nothing
less than an attempt to cheat St. Peter, who, you
know, keeps the keys of heaven, by knocking at the
gate in the disguise of a monk or a friar.”

“I have too much faith in St. Peter’s
vigilance and penetration,” said Mrs. Shortridge,
“to think he has ever been so taken in.”